Poll
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Pacific Rim vs. Godzilla (2014)
Not a comparison about who would win in a fight, but which was the better film.
Overall, I give it to Pacific Rim. The new Godzilla has a bit more artistic ambition - the director was really channeling his inner Spielberg, in his Close Encounters Of The Third Kind mode - but Pacific Rim has many more OMG nerdgasm moments, as Guillermo Del Toro channels James Cameron's heavy metal style into his love of monster mash.
I enjoyed Pacific Rim better IMO. Godzilla seemed like it was stuck trying to either be a Cloverfield-esque horror film or a Pacific Rim-esque monster smackdown, and was never able to get a proper balance between the two. Pacific Rim knew exactly what it wanted to be from the start of the film and fulfilled it's potential absolutely. Also, the human stories in Pacific Rim were great, whereas Godzilla seemed to completely forget about Bryan Cranston's character and his death (which by all rights should have been the most emotional moment of the film) the moment after it happened. Also, while Godzilla did have excellent SFX, it lacked the majestic artistry and imagination of Del Toro's visuals.
I guess to summarize, Godzilla was so focused on doing justice to the original films that not enough attention was paid on the script, whereas Pacific Rim had the ability to be unbounded by expectations of past franchises and go at it's own flow.
I enjoyed both the same for different reasons. Godzilla was a great disaster and kaiju movie, and the best Godzilla movie since the heisei era, IMHO. Maybe it takes itself too seriously at times.
Pacific Rim was a feast for the senses. It's a movie that kaiju, sci-fi and anime lovers can appreciate without thinking too much in plotholes. Just grab your corn, turn off your brain and enjoy the ride.
tl;dr: PF would be the Avatar to Godzilla's Prometheus (?)
Pacific Rim was by far more to my liking. I actually fell asleep watching Godzilla, which is a sure sign that the movie was boring. It was more about the people, and less about the monster. I mean shit, huge monsters are running around, either flee or die, which was as far as I thought that they were going to take it, but then they went into overtime on the family that kept losing loved ones.
Originally posted by Stoic
Pacific Rim was by far more to my liking. I actually fell asleep watching Godzilla, which is a sure sign that the movie was boring. It was more about the people, and less about the monster. I mean shit, huge monsters are running around, either flee or die, which was as far as I thought that they were going to take it, but then they went into overtime on the family that kept losing loved ones.
The focus on the humans would have been fine IMO, if the humans actually had more than one-dimension to them. Aaron Taylor Johnson acting like a plank of wood after his father just died in front of him was incredibly weak and IMO was the main hindrance of the film.
Originally posted by Lestov16
The focus on the humans would have been fine IMO, if the humans actually had more than one-dimension to them. Aaron Taylor Johnson acting like a plank of wood after his father just died in front of him was incredibly weak and IMO was the main hindrance of the film.
Yep, I thought that I was the only one thinking that. Not to mention losing his mom to the same fate. If it was me I'd be a basket case. Then again there are people that live in tornado country, and refuse to move. Is this any different? LOL
I thought Pacific Rim was gonna be crap and came away reasonably pleased that it was better than I expected. I thought Godzilla was gonna be great and came away disappointed in that the human characters were all pretty shit and there wasn't enough monster action.
So for me they both end up in that middle ground, average, reasonably entertaining movies.
Originally posted by Stoic
Yep, I thought that I was the only one thinking that. Not to mention losing his mom to the same fate. If it was me I'd be a basket case. Then again there are people that live in tornado country, and refuse to move. Is this any different? LOL
It ruined the movie for me, or at least stopped it from reaching my expectations. I don't think here is a single scene where he laments his dad's death. I think we see him mention it in passing but we never see him express emotion to it. And I don't even think Taylor Johnson did a bad job. He was definitely believable as a soldier trying to get back to his family, it's that the script completely forgot that his father died. It's like the writers completely forgot about Bryan Cranston the moment he died, even when giving MONARCH info of his dad, he doesn't tell them about his apartment cache, he just tells them his dad found out the MUTOs were communicating, which they would have found out anyway once Las Vegas got obliterated.
Cranston served no purpose, and that is a big mistake on the writers part since Cranston's character, even just the mere potential emotional effect it could have on Brody, would have easily made it the emotional highlight of the film and thus made the characters more relatable. As I said, Brody was believable as a soldier racing to get to his family, but not believable as a grieving orphan, mainly because the writers completely ignored that emotional potential to focus on Godzilla and the MUTOs. And while the scenes of Brody and family in danger were thrilling and suspenseful, they lacked an emotional punch that could have easily been there and thus felt missing, making the scenes somewhat hollow.
To compare, let's take Cloverfield. In that pretty much the same thing happens, Rob's brother dies right in front of him. We immediately see the emotional toll this takes on him, and understand exactly why he is rushing to get to his girlfriend. It thus made the scenes where they were in danger more suspenseful, because we knew exactly what the emotional stakes were. Hell, Pacific Rim. It is made very clear how the loss of loved ones has effected the main characters and how it drives them and thus the plot. Now in Godzilla, Brody's trying to get to his family, but because his father's death hasn't seemed to have effected him, he lacks Rob's passionate determination. You can tell Brody wants to get back to his family, but no moreso than any other soldier that was there. He was a stock soldier who lacked any additional layer of emotional depth, even though it was practically set up for him, because the production crew wanted to focus more on long beautiful scenery gorn shots than focus on it's characters, even though considering the intended screentime of the monsters, the characters are the only thing to hold the film.
It really seems to me that Bryan Cranston's character was written in this as an afterthought. Almost like they filmed the movie already and then somebody got a call saying Cranston wanted to be in it and the producers seeing cash signs due to his Breaking Bad recognition. They then filmed a new beginning to the film and reshot parts of the film to include him pretty much as an extended cameo. Again, this is a bad move when Cranston was easily the best character of the film. Killing the best character in the film and then making virtually no consequence or emotional impact of it is childish writing. As stated, it was trying to be a mix between Cloverfield and PR, and couldn't reach a proper balance, mainly because we had no emotional investment in the characters because Cranston's death and entire character was meaningless.
I enjoyed the film and thought it was an entertaining spectacle, but I found many flaws within in, and completely understand the criticisms levied against it. I also do not think it was nearly as good as past summer blockbusters such as Pacific Rim or Man of Steel.
When Bryan Cranston loses his wife in the film, I didn't feel anything. And it didn't help to set up any special resentment of the MUTO later in the film, so there was no payoff for ATJ's confronting it. There was certainly nothing like the moist eyes I was getting after the deaths of Kirk's father and Spock's mother in the recent Star Trek. Pacific Rim really made me care a lot more about their characters.